September 4th, 2025

#8 | Central America’s unaccomplished independence

The week’s drop reveals the uneasy crosscurrents defining Central America’s present. In Costa Rica, the arrest of four suspects in the killing of Nicaraguan opposition leader Roberto Samcam shows how repression and violence do not stop at national borders. In El Salvador, President Nayib Bukele’s continued use of public money to fuel his Bitcoin experiment signals a defiance of international warnings and a gamble with the nation’s economic future.

Yet beneath these events lies a deeper reckoning with history and global entanglement. Two centuries after independence, Central America still struggles with the gap between sovereignty and true emancipation, as cycles of migration now turn in reverse and families are pushed back into precarious homelands. At the same time, Guatemala’s ties to the ongoing genocide in Palestine illustrate how the region’s political elite remain bound to wider systems of violence and complicity, forcing us to ask what kind of future independence really promises.

Staff Picks

Nostalgia for Democracy? Utopias and Historical Debts in Nicaragua is a book that seeks to chart a horizon of struggle and possibility for all Nicaraguans.

First, we analyze the role of democracy in Sandinista thought, where it has been used to justify acts of corruption, violence, and repression. Then, we reflect on what democracy has meant for the Women’s Movement, what debts remain outstanding throughout history, and its demands in the current sociopolitical context. We also question the scope of this word on the Caribbean Coast, an autonomous territory undergoing a process of co-optation by the Nicaraguan state. Finally, we analyze the importance of democracy in the field of art and culture, a space where new disputes and debates continue to emerge that are fundamental to rethinking our future democratic life.

The book is currently only available in Spanish. Download here:

Nostalgia de la democracia – HoraCero